The two permits of the project are down dip of Northern Energy’s Elimatta project and Xstrata Coal’s giant Wandoan project.

More drilling will kick off in 2011 to boost this resource into the indicated category.

“Although the primary focus remains on the Macalister upper seam it is becoming apparent that the Kogan and Macalister lower seams are correlatable in some areas and there may be scope to include these additional seams in the resource through the planned, closer-spaced drilling,” MetroCoal said this week.

The additional 89 million tonnes of resources gives MetroCoal a total thermal coal resource of 709Mt in the Surat Basin for possible underground coal mining and underground coal gasification.

MetroCoal shares are down half a cent to 34.5c this morning.